Autobiography by John Stuart Mill (easy books to read txt) 📖

the greater part of

the Book on Induction. When this was done, I had, as it seemed to me,

untied all the really hard knots, and the completion of the book had

become only a question of time. Having got thus far, I had to leave off

in order to write two articles for the next number of the _Review_. When

these were written, I returned to the subject, and now for the first

time fell in with Comte's _Cours de Philosophie Positive_, or rather

with the two volumes of it which were all that had at that time been

published. My theory of Induction was substantially completed before I

knew of Comte's book; and it is perhaps well that I came to it by a

different road from his, since the consequence has been that my treatise

contains, what his certainly does not, a reduction of the inductive

process to strict rules and to a scientific test, such as the syllogism

is for ratiocination. Comte is always precise and profound on the method

of investigation, but he does not even attempt any exact definition of

the conditions of proof: and his writings show that he never attained a

just conception of them. This, however, was specifically the problem,

which, in treating of Induction, I had proposed to myself. Nevertheless,

I gained much from Comte, with which to enrich my chapters in the

subsequent rewriting: and his book was of essential service to me in

some of the parts which still remained to be thought out. As his

subsequent volumes successively made their appearance, I read them with

avidity, but, when he reached the subject of Social Science, with

varying feelings. The fourth volume disappointed me: it contained those

of his opinions on social subjects with which I most disagree. But the

fifth, containing the connected view of history, rekindled all my

enthusiasm; which the sixth (or concluding) volume did not materially

abate. In a merely logical point of view, the only leading conception

for which I am indebted to him is that of the Inverse Deductive Method,

as the one chiefly applicable to the complicated subjects of History and

Statistics: a process differing from the more common form of the

deductive method in this--that instead of arriving at its conclusions

by general reasoning, and verifying them by specific experience (as is

the natural order in the deductive branches of physical science), it

obtains its generalizations by a collation of specific experience, and

verifies them by ascertaining whether they are such as would follow from

known general principles. This was an idea entirely new to me when I

found it in Comte: and but for him I might not soon (if ever) have

arrived at it.

 

I had been long an ardent admirer of Comte's writings before I had any

communication with himself; nor did I ever, to the last, see him in the

body. But for some years we were frequent correspondents, until our

correspondence became controversial, and our zeal cooled. I was the

first to slacken correspondence; he was the first to drop it. I found,

and he probably found likewise, that I could do no good to his mind, and

that all the good he could do to mine, he did by his books. This would

never have led to discontinuance of intercourse, if the differences

between us had been on matters of simple doctrine. But they were chiefly

on those points of opinion which blended in both of us with our

strongest feelings, and determined the entire direction of our

aspirations. I had fully agreed with him when he maintained that the

mass of mankind, including even their rulers in all the practical

departments of life, must, from the necessity of the case, accept most

of their opinions on political and social matters, as they do on

physical, from the authority of those who have bestowed more study on

those subjects than they generally have it in their power to do. This

lesson had been strongly impressed on me by the early work of Comte, to

which I have adverted. And there was nothing in his great Treatise which

I admired more than his remarkable exposition of the benefits which the

nations of modern Europe have historically derived from the separation,

during the Middle Ages, of temporal and spiritual power, and the

distinct organization of the latter. I agreed with him that the moral

and intellectual ascendancy, once exercised by priests, must in time

pass into the hands of philosophers, and will naturally do so when they

become sufficiently unanimous, and in other respects worthy to possess

But when he exaggerated this line of thought into a practical

system, in which philosophers were to be organized into a kind of

corporate hierarchy, invested with almost the same spiritual supremacy

(though without any secular power) once possessed by the Catholic

Church; when I found him relying on this spiritual authority as the only

security for good government, the sole bulwark against practical

oppression, and expecting that by it a system of despotism in the state

and despotism in the family would be rendered innocuous and beneficial;

it is not surprising, that while as logicians we were nearly at one, as

sociologists we could travel together no further. M. Comte lived to

carry out these doctrines to their extremest consequences, by planning,

in his last work, the _Système de Politique Positive_, the completest

system of spiritual and temporal despotism which ever yet emanated from

a human brain, unless possibly that of Ignatius Loyola: a system by

which the yoke of general opinion, wielded by an organized body of

spiritual teachers and rulers, would be made supreme over every action,

and as far as is in human possibility, every thought, of every member of

the community, as well in the things which regard only himself, as in

those which concern the interests of others. It is but just to say that

this work is a considerable improvement, in many points of feeling, over

Comte's previous writings on the same subjects: but as an accession to

social philosophy, the only value it seems to me to possess, consists in

putting an end to the notion that no effectual moral authority can be

maintained over society without the aid of religious belief; for Comte's

work recognises no religion except that of Humanity, yet it leaves an

irresistible conviction that any moral beliefs concurred in by the

community generally may be brought to bear upon the whole conduct and

lives of its individual members, with an energy and potency truly

alarming to think of. The book stands a monumental warning to thinkers

on society and politics, of what happens when once men lose sight, in

their speculations, of the value of Liberty and of Individuality.

 

To return to myself. The _Review_ engrossed, for some time longer,

nearly all the time I could devote to authorship, or to thinking with

authorship in view. The articles from the _London and Westminster

Review_ which are reprinted in the _Dissertations_, are scarcely a

fourth part of those I wrote. In the conduct of the _Review_ I had two

principal objects. One was to free philosophic radicalism from the

reproach of sectarian Benthamism. I desired, while retaining the

precision of expression, the definiteness of meaning, the contempt of

declamatory phrases and vague generalities, which were so honourably

characteristic both of Bentham and of my father, to give a wider basis

and a more free and genial character to Radical speculations; to show

that there was a Radical philosophy, better and more complete than

Bentham's, while recognizing and incorporating all of Bentham's which is

permanently valuable. In this first object I, to a certain extent,

succeeded. The other thing I attempted, was to stir up the educated

Radicals, in and out of Parliament, to exertion, and induce them to make

themselves, what I thought by using the proper means they might become

--a powerful party capable of taking the government of the country, or

at least of dictating the terms on which they should share it with the

Whigs. This attempt was from the first chimerical: partly because the

time was unpropitious, the Reform fervour being in its period of ebb,

and the Tory influences powerfully rallying; but still more, because, as

Austin so truly said, "the country did not contain the men." Among the

Radicals in Parliament there were several qualified to be useful members

of an enlightened Radical party, but none capable of forming and leading

such a party. The exhortations I addressed to them found no response.

One occasion did present itself when there seemed to be room for a bold

and successful stroke for Radicalism. Lord Durham had left the ministry,

by reason, as was thought, of their not being sufficiently Liberal; he

afterwards accepted from them the task of ascertaining and removing the

causes of the Canadian rebellion; he had shown a disposition to surround

himself at the outset with Radical advisers; one of his earliest

measures, a good measure both in intention and in effect, having been

disapproved and reversed by the Government at home, he had resigned his

post, and placed himself openly in a position of quarrel with the

Ministers. Here was a possible chief for a Radical party in the person

of a man of importance, who was hated by the Tories and had just been

injured by the Whigs. Any one who had the most elementary notions of

party tactics, must have attempted to make something of such an

opportunity. Lord Durham was bitterly attacked from all sides, inveighed

against by enemies, given up by timid friends; while those who would

willingly have defended him did not know what to say. He appeared to be

returning a defeated and discredited man. I had followed the Canadian

events from the beginning; I had been one of the prompters of his

prompters; his policy was almost exactly what mine would have been, and

I was in a position to defend it. I wrote and published a manifesto in

the _Review_, in which I took the very highest ground in his behalf,

claiming for him not mere acquittal, but praise and honour. Instantly a

number of other writers took up the tone: I believe there was a portion

of truth in what Lord Durham, soon after, with polite exaggeration, said

to me--that to this article might be ascribed the almost triumphal

reception which he met with on his arrival in England. I believe it to

have been the word in season, which, at a critical moment, does much to

decide the result; the touch which determines whether a stone, set in

motion at the top of an eminence, shall roll down on one side or on the

other. All hopes connected with Lord Durham as a politician soon

vanished; but with regard to Canadian, and generally to colonial policy,

the cause was gained: Lord Durham's report, written by Charles Buller,

partly under the inspiration of Wakefield, began a new era; its

recommendations, extending to complete internal self-government, were in

full operation in Canada within two or three years, and have been since

extended to nearly all the other colonies, of European race, which have

any claim to the character of important communities. And I may say that

in successfully upholding the reputation of Lord Durham and his advisers

at the most important moment, I contributed materially to this result.

 

One other case occurred during my conduct of the _Review_, which

similarly illustrated the effect of taking a prompt initiative. I

believe that the early success and reputation of Carlyle's _French

Revolution_, were considerably accelerated by what I wrote about it in

the _Review_. Immediately on its publication, and before the commonplace

critics, all whose rules and modes of judgment it set at defiance, had

time to pre-occupy the public with their disapproval of it, I wrote and

published a review of the book, hailing it as one of those productions

of genius which are above all rules, and are a law to themselves.

Neither in this case nor in that of Lord Durham do I ascribe the

impression, which I think was produced by what I wrote, to any

particular merit of execution: indeed, in at least one of the cases (the

article on Carlyle) I do not think the execution was good. And in both

instances, I am persuaded that anybody, in a position to be read, who

had expressed the same opinion at the same precise time, and had made

any tolerable statement of the just grounds for it, would have produced

the same effect. But, after the complete failure of my hopes of putting

a new life into Radical politics by means of the _Review_, I am glad to

look back on these two instances of success in an honest attempt to do

mediate service to things and persons that deserved it. After the last

hope of the formation of a Radical party had disappeared, it was time

for me to stop the heavy expenditure of time and money which